Thou shall have balls & not business ideas

“Thou shall have balls & not business ideas”And 9 more commandments for startups from Indian entrepreneur, angel investor Vishal Gondal that will lead the “path to the promised land”

(Called ‘India’s King of Gaming’, Vishal Gondal is the Founder and CEO of India Games. He is considered among the among the top 25 powerful people in the Indian digital business. Erstwhile, he was the Managing Director of DisneyUTV Digital.He has received no formal education in computers and is a commerce dropout.Gondal shared his 10 commandments for startups)

We present to you the commandments…

Thou shall have balls & not business plans

Ideas are dime a dozen. To be an entrepreneur you don’t need business plans but the courage and conviction to break through the initial challenges and bring your ideas to life.

Thou shall develop relationships & not transactions
Entrepreneurs should go out, meet people and invest in building long-term relationships. Those who can’t help you today may prove to be valuable tomorrow. Don’t be transactional about it; make lifelong friends!

Thou shall focus on real pain-points

India is the land of opportunity because it has tonnes of problems for entrepreneurs to solve. Instead of aping solutions from the West, we should look at solving local problems – something not many entrepreneurs are doing today.

Thou shall be among the top 2
It’s imperative that you be No. 1 or No. 2 nationally or internationally in your defined sector to ensure you create a larger market for yourself. There is no point in becoming the nth player in an already competitive marketplace which has established leaders.

Thou shall focus on 20 per cent
As an entrepreneur, you must focus on the 20% that gives you 80% impact. Entrepreneurs tend to waste their time and effort in a number of non-productive activities just to be everywhere. This should be avoided at all costs.

Thou shall avoid MBAs & spreadsheet makers

The education system is designed to train students to fill up competencies required to work in large organisations. Startups are meant to disrupt and are run by talking to people and constantly taking feedback from the ground. The mindset required to excel at a startup is very different from one that is required in a large company where there is time to invest in building year by year projections.

Thou shall celebrate failures & enjoy your journey

As an entrepreneur, you will have many moments of failure. Organisations where failing is not okay tend to become bureaucratic. As a startup, you should build a culture which celebrates failure and people have the independence to experiment and execute new ideas without worrying too much about failure.

Thou shall not want to sell
Don’t build your company with the intention to sell. You can’t build a great startup by dreaming about selling it someday. As an entrepreneur, your startup becomes the core of your life and you have to nurture it like your own baby.

Thou shall be fit
As an entrepreneur, one tends to put their health on the backseat but there is no point in building a billion-dollar company and having boiled vegetables with a IV attached to you. If you aren’t fit both, in mind and body, you cannot operate a company.

Thou shall win with… Passion
As a startup you will have a small set of people who won’t always have the best skills or resources at their disposal. In this case, the only thing you can motivate them with, is PASSION. As an entrepreneur you need to make your team believe that this is their chance to do something remarkable with their career!